ABOUT

Paweł CZARAKCZIEW. Cellist, chamber musician, and educator. He made his stage debut at the age of six, performing at the Kraków Philharmonic. Four years later, at the Polish Embassy in Paris, he appeared as a soloist with the orchestra of the Academy of Music in Kraków under the baton of Prof. Stanisław Krawczyński.

A recipient of scholarships from the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the Rector of the Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music in Kraków, as well as the Educational Award of the Royal Capital City of Kraków. In 2022 he was nominated for the prestigious Fulbright Junior Research Award 2022–2023, within which he conducted artistic research at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

In 2025 he earned a Doctor of Musical Arts degree with a dissertation devoted to the life and jazz oeuvre of Frederick Katz. He studied cello under Marta Nowaczyk-Łapińska and jazz cello under Mateusz Pliniewicz at the Bronisław Rutkowski State Music School in Kraków. In 2020 he graduated with distinction from the Academy of Music in Kraków (now the Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music) in the class of Prof. Zdzisław Łapiński. He also refined his skills under Julius Berger at the Leopold Mozart Center in Augsburg and studied chamber music with Anna Armatys-Borelli, Kaja Danczowska and Barbara Łypik-Sobaniec.

He has performed in Austria, China, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Spain, Germany, Norway, Slovakia, the United States, the United Kingdom and Hungary. He has appeared at numerous festivals including Bachfest Leipzig, La Jolla Music Society’s SummerFest, Dni Muzyki, Paderewski Lecture-Recital, Gra w Klasykę, Krakowska Wiosna Wiolonczelowa, Emanacje – International Music Festival, Muzyka u Czartoryskich and 4th Cello Shanghai Festival.

His interest in improvisation – often beyond the strict boundaries of classical performance – has led him to a wide range of jazz, dance and theatre projects. He has performed at events such as Jazz under Himmelen, the International Festival of Errant Theatres, the International Dance Theatre Encounters, the National Open Theatre Meetings, and the Wadowice Theatre Encounters “Zgraja”.

He is a co-founder of Czarakcziew and the Jazz Cats, the Cracow Harp Quintet, and the Czarakcziew / Kowal Duo. Since 2020 he has taught cello at the Bronisław Rutkowski State Music School in Kraków, and since 2024 he has served as a faculty member of the Department of Cello and Double Bass at the Krzysztof Penderecki Academy of Music in Kraków.